[Ads-l] Be the you...

Jonathan Lighter wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM
Fri Jun 17 18:22:34 UTC 2016


"Be the you who talks to your dermatologist about Stelara!"

So urges my TV.  This structure reminds me of the equally odd, equally
transparent, "Nobody doesn't like Sara Lee!"

I think it was explained here that the Sara Lee slogan sounded quite
weird in the mid '60s, even if today's whippersnappers say "Meh."

It also reminds me of a formula I first encountered around 1993:
"Don't be that guy!"

"That guy" being the clumsy or obnoxious luckless loser who may be
expected to show up at, or participate in, some specified activity.

Oddly, GB seems to afford no twentieth century exx.

JL
-- 
"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org



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